The National Symbol Falls To Tough Times

DENVER — Federal game wardens are using sophisticated satellite technology developed during the Cold War to identify ranchers in the Rocky Mountain West who are killing American bald eagles.

Hundreds of the immense white-headed birds, which are supposed to be protected by law as the symbol of the United States, have died in recent months, victims of poisoned bait. To date, charges have been filed against only three men.

With about 2,600 breeding pairs of bald eagles left in the lower 48 states, the new spate of poisonings threatens a recovery program that was started in 1963 when the number of nesting pairs had dipped to 400.

Then as now, wildlife experts and livestock industry spokesmen attribute the poisonings to ranchers pinched by tight markets who are trying to hold down the number of sheep and cattle lost to eagles, coyotes and other predators.

Denver-based federal wildlife officials documented the growing scope of clandestine eagle killing in a remote corner of northern Utah on April 7.

During a reconnaissance flight, federal and Utah state game wardens spotted a suspicious-looking collection of carcasses in a remote area called Taylor Draw near Echo, Utah.

They used a military Global Positioning System satellite, designed to target bombers and maneuverable nuclear missiles, to pinpoint the carcasses`

location, which was far from any roads or trails.

Those precise coordinates allowed ground crews to quickly reach the carcasses, scattered over just a few dozen square feet in a vast expanse of sagebrush and saw grass prairie.

A dozen bald eagles and one golden eagle had collapsed within a few feet of the carcasses of two deer and two sheep that had been filled with strychnine powder.

Terry Grosz, chief investigator for the Denver-based U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Mountain Prairie Region, said finding such sites quickly allows police to find fresh clues and allows more accurate estimates of just how many birds are being killed.

An accurate count of the poisoning toll is impossible because other predators quickly arrive to feed on the flesh of fallen birds.

But based on the Utah discovery and others made during the past few months, Grosz said, ``you`d certainly be accurate to put the (annual eagle slaughter) number in the many hundreds if not more.``

Concern over the slaughter has prompted a major federal investigation. Affidavits filed in federal courts in Denver show that FBI agents and other investigators suspect the owners of roughly two dozen sheep and cattle ranches in northwestern Colorado, southern Wyoming and northern Utah are involved.

To date, charges have been filed only against three men: Raymond Hall of Pueblo, Colo., a dealer in cyanide ``coyote-getter`` devices; Rick Strom, a Wyoming rancher; and Randy Graham, operator of Wyoming`s Predator Control Laboratory in Cheyenne, who allegedly used state facilities to supply illegal poisons to several ranchers.

Hall has pleaded guilty and currently is under court order to wear an electronic monitor and stay near his home. The two Wyoming men await trial.

The investigation into other ranchers and alleged poison sellers is being coordinated before a grand jury in Colorado by the U.S. Justice Department`s Environmental Crimes Division. Officials have declined to discuss the cases.

With the eagle population currently making its annual spring migration from wintering grounds, poisoning incidents are expected to grow.

Investigators like Grosz believe the culprits in the poisonings are sheep growers, a segment of the livestock industry facing particularly severe economic conditions with low wool and mutton prices and high grazing costs.

Whatever the killers` motives, the growing eagle slaughter threatens an endangered species as well as one protected by federal law as the American icon. There are only 7,500 to 10,000 bald eagles in the lower 48 states.

Among them are only 2,600 breeding pairs because of the shortage of females and their tendency to bond for life with a male. The law protecting eagles as the national bird carries a penalty of 1 year in prison and a fine of $100,000.

Although industry leaders condemn ranchers for breaking the law, they also express sympathy for drovers and herders.

Larry Bourret, executive vice president of the Wyoming Farm Bureau who for the past 20 years has lobbied for increased federal predator control on behalf of the sheep industry, said, ``You need to keep in mind that the people who are doing this are acting out of nothing less than fear over their own survival.

``We do not condone anybody breaking the law by poisoning eagles, coyotes or any other protected animal, but we as an industry also know firsthand the pressures these (lawbreakers) are up against.``

While there is great concern about the eagles, the poison traps` actual targets often are coyotes, mountain lions or other predators, Bourret said. But he acknowledged that sheep ranchers record heavy losses to eagles each year.